WORKSHOP 2009 - Workshop on Technology-enhanced Science Education (TeSE) @ICALT2009

Website http://www.ask4research.info/icalt/2009/ | Edit Freely

Category WORKSHOP 2009

Deadline: February 23, 2009 | Date: July 14, 2009

Venue/Country: Riga, Latvia

Updated: 2010-06-04 19:32:22 (GMT+9)

Call For Papers - CFP

Technology-enhanced Science Education (TeSE)

at

The 9th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies (ICALT 2009)

Riga, Latvia, 14-18 July, 2009

http://www.ask4research.info/icalt/2009/

Workshop Organisers:

Chun-Yen Chang, Director of Science Education Center, National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan changcyntnu.edu.tw

Demetrios G. Sampson, University of Piraeus & CERTH, Greece sampsonunipi.gr

Sofoklis Sotiriou, Ellinogermaniki Agogi, Greece sotiriouea.gr

Workshop Description

According to modern pedagogy, teaching should be guided by a holistic planning process that takes the students' learning processes, the subject matter and the teaching methods into account. Students' orientation is a very important and significant variable which correlates positively with students' performance. It offers students the chance to link the information presented to their prior experience and knowledge. They have the chance to engage in an active and self-guided learning process. Consequently, effective learning processes should be designed with student's prior experience and knowledge. For to learn science in meaningful ways students need to see connections to familiar problems relevant and important in their daily lives. Additionally, situated learning fosters the ability to transfer acquired knowledge to a variety of different situations. Situated learning is an essential component of acquiring the ability for self-organised and self-regulated learning. Ideally schools should provide opportunities for the development of a competence to learn and, an ability to be an autonomous learner in the future. This includes the development of meta-cognitive learning competences like e.g. elaboration strategies or learning strategies and their application and usefulness. Learning processes in the future will be embedded in communicative situations, where teaching science offers good conditions for fostering communication and cooperation in students' experimental practices.

Over the last two decades the development of technological tools for enhancing education has had a profound impact on the process of science teaching and learning. The design and application of new technologies, such as augmented reality, virtual reality, portable devices, wearable computers, simulations and computer modelling of physical phenomena in science classrooms has allowed the enhancement and enrichment of their current curriculum. However, the introduction of such innovating tools into students¡¯ learning experience itself, cannot improve their learning without the active participation of their educators. With the employment of innovative and highly interactive technologies as well as available authoring tools, the educators are able to implement sets of demonstrators to enhance the quality and effectiveness of the teaching and learning process. Furthermore, technology-enhanced learning tools give the opportunity to connect science education with real life and motivate learners to engage themselves in exploratory learning.

The proposed workshop aims to become a test-bed for exploring the reform of science education supported by innovative technology tools. The application of various leading edge technologies that can transform the educational environment and the teaching and learning processes is further examined. This workshop embraces the interconnection between science teaching and everyday activities, along with the instructional influence upon learning processes. Moreover, modern techniques of organising digital content and metadata are investigated along with educational resources that use these appropriate metadata to form learning objects. The mapping of pioneering technologies to enhance science education identifies sets of technological tools in which science centres and schools should invest in the near future. This will create valuable teaching and learning processes that will effectively capture the needs of modern communities.

Main research questions addressed at the workshop

How could school science meet daily life experience in order to avoid common misconceptions related to science education?

How could cutting edge scientific knowledge be transferred to classrooms and improve the learning process when interacting with experiments that use state-of-the-art equipment?

How could metadata tools help educators and learners in accessing more efficiently, existing scientific data?

Expected results

The expected results from the workshop are the following:

The presentation of the design, application and analysis of innovative technologies for enhancing science education.

The adaptation of a modular approach in science teaching that allows the quantification of observations and the identification of patterns and theories.

The extension of the educators¡¯ and researchers¡¯ network interested in this area.

Participants

The workshop is addressed to the following audience:

Educators, pedagogical experts, policy makers, experts in advanced technological applications and students interested in the design and development of authoring tools.

Designers of innovative educational applications, business planning experts and researchers who explore or want to explore new approaches in science teaching.

Students, educators, content providers and curriculum developers interested in projects that use new technologies in classrooms to enhance learning and enrich the school¡¯s science curriculum.

Workshop Organization

The workshop will last for 2,5 hours. Speakers will give a presentation of 20 min including the time for a round of questions. The last 30 min of the session will be devoted to a general debate about the presented approaches and the future perspectives.

Paper Submission

Authors are invited submit two page papers describing research related to TeSE for inclusion in the IEEE conference proceedings of ICALT2009. All papers should be in accessible Microsoft Word format and will be peer-reviewed.

Submission Dates

Two-page papers for review for inclusion in the IEEE conference proceedings of ICALT2009.

February 23, 2009 - Paper submission sent to Prof D. G. Sampson [sampsonunipi.gr]

March 3, 2009 - Notification of acceptance to Authors

March 13, 2009 - At least one author of the accepted paper should register to the ICALT2009 Conference, according to the ICALT Guidelines (to be announced in the ICALT2009 Web Site)

March 25, 2009 - Final Camera Ready manuscript sent to Prof D. G. Sampson [sampsonunipi.gr] and Copyright Form submission according to the ICALT Guidlines (to be announced in the ICALT2009 Web Site).

Contact Details

Direct any questions on TeSEICALT2009 to Prof D. G. Sampson, University of Piraeus & CERTH, Greece [sampsonunipi.gr]